


Last Time

by CCaptainRex



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Angst, Coping, Does major character death count if its a ghost?, Hurt/Comfort, Minor Richard Gansey III/Blue Sargent, Noah Czerny needs a hug, Raven Cycle Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:15:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25511200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CCaptainRex/pseuds/CCaptainRex
Summary: Noah was gone.Henry didn't know him.Ronan loved him like a brother.Adam cared too much about everyone.Gansey never thought it would end like this.But Blue? Blue was the one who kept him here, who gave him power, who knew all his secrets and all his fears and wanted nothing more than to reach out and hold his hand or tell him a joke and hear him laugh one last time.*******************The Gang(sey) deal with the fact Noah's never coming back.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 14





	Last Time

Noah was gone. 

Blue confided in Noah; Though dead, he was a good friend and, despite the fact she was dating Gansey, she talked about everything with Noah. He was her first kiss, he was her secret-keeper, he listened and disappeared and reappeared again without a word, was a whisper in the back of her mind and was her friend. He was a ghost who liked hugs and gelato and Blue never got to give him either. 

_'I'd ask you out if I were alive.'_

After the possession, after the fight and the trip to the hospital, after Gansey dying and coming back, Blue expected Noah to be there. She expected him to appear on the leyline and tease them about taking so long or make a joke and be Noah. Be there. Be here, for her, when she needed him most. 

_'I'd say okay,'_

She'd buried Noah twice already, and today, she did it a third time. Ronan had suggested a Viking funeral, not as a joke, and it was something Noah would've wanted. So they stand at the edge of the nearest lake, in funeral attire, and Blue breaks first. She sobs, quietly, and surprises everyone around her. 

Henry didn't know him. 

Ronan loved him like a brother.

Adam cared too much about everyone.

Gansey never thought it would end like this. 

But Blue? Blue was the one who kept him here, who gave him power, who knew all his secrets and all his fears and wanted nothing more than to reach out and hold his hand or tell him a joke and hear him laugh one last time.

She holds a framed picture of Noah in her hands and cries because she never got to say goodbye. She never got to tell him she forgave him for what happened. She never got that last hug. It's Ronan who reaches out and pulls her into his chest, resting his forehead on the top of her head and whispers a small prayer into her spiky hair. 

_'I know why you're mad.'_

Ronan confided in Noah. Noah somehow knew all of his secrets and kept them. He was there, in his car when he was street racing and would wrestle him on the dusty floor of Monmouth and didn't care when Ronan threw him out the window. Ronan remembers the feeling of Noah using his power, feeling that drain and fear and wondered if that was all that Noah felt when he was here. A draining, sinking feeling. 

_'Tell me then, Prophet.'_

After everything they'd been through, and put Noah through? Ronan didn't think the guy would ever actually die. Well, again. But then he got that same sinking feeling after a week of nothing and he knew, deep down, he isn't the one who convinced Cabeswater to die for Gansey, no, Noah did. Noah reached out and sacrificed his life for Gansey, again. Life wasn't fair. It wasn't fair to what it did to dreamers or dreams, and out of everyone, Noah got the short end of the stick. Ronan missed him so much more than he was willing to admit. 

_'It's not my job to tell other people's secrets.'_

They put together a cardboard box of photos, and Gansey placed it in the water at the edge of the shore, and Ronan dug into his pocket for a lighter before tossing it towards Gansey. It seemed the universe knew that today was a sad, dark day, and rain slowly fell. Blue watched from Ronan's side as Gansey lit the box on fire and shoved it out into the water, and they watched as a collective group as it disappeared into the fog that was slowly building. 

_'You will live because of Glendower. Someone else on the ley line is dying when they should not, and so you will live when you should not.'_

Gansey had felt so ridiculously stupid he didn't put two and two together with Noah. He never saw him sleep, or eat, and he made constant jokes about being dead. He remembers all too vividly seeing Noah's bones that day and wondering how long he'd be blind, and how long Noah was in pain. What being dead, something Gansey should be, felt like. What made a ghost, a ghost? 

_'Don't throw it away.'_

Noah died so he could live. Noah's life was the sacrifice for him, and when he met Glendower, his wish was for Noah to be brought back to life. Turns out, life doesn't work that way, and Glendower never gave him the chance to save his friend. Gansey had died, a second time, but it wasn't permanent. Not like how Noah was, now, in a grave on a leyline in heaven. Hopefully, in heaven.

"Does anyone have something they want to say?" Adam asks quietly, unsure of the silence around him. He was never the closest to Noah, not like Ronan was, but he was there when Adam needed him. When he was scrying, Noah was afraid for him. When everything went down with his dad, Noah was there for him. More often than not, Noah was a presence Adam took for granted. He regrets that now.

_'Don't throw it away,'_

Everyone in their strange little group was tied to Noah in one way or another. It was a piece missing in a puzzle, it was a fear deep within him, it was the knowledge that Noah warned the others when he awoke Cabeswater. In a sad, twisted way, everyone has their time on this earth, and Adam knew that more than anyone. Noah was at peace, now. It was what he needed, a final resting place and an eternity of peace, but he deserved so much more. 

_'I'm trying not to.'_

"Noah was a piece of shit," Ronan says with a small crack to his voice. "And he deserved better." 

"Well put," Gansey responds and stuffs his hands into his suit pockets. "Noah is the only reason I'm here, today, and I owe him my life. I really do." 

"Noah was the only person I've ever met who could be so annoying and yet loveable at the same time." It's not like them to stick around, or be sentimental, and its a shared quiet look as the boys head back towards the Pig, but Blue can't bring herself to move. Gansey holds her hand and squeezes it. "I just need a moment, okay?" Gansey nods with a smile and jogs up to where they parked, and Blue turns back towards the lake. Noah's really, truly gone. There's no more late-night appearances, weird questions, or kisses. There's nothing left but memories and pictures and the car that disappeared with Cabeswater. "It's not fair," People disappeared and came back into her life like clockwork. But lately, that didn't seem true. Not with Persephone, and now with Noah. "You're not allowed to leave me here, Noah." 

The wind and sound of the lake meet her, and her grip tightens on the framed picture of them doing stupid shit together. She hurls it into the lake with a scream and almost starts to cry again. She just wants to say goodbye, to tell Noah she loves him, and that he did deserve so much better than the cards he was dealt with. She's hesitant to head back to the car, to finally let go, when something catches her eye in the water. It's one of the photos from the box that made it's way back to shore, and she stares at the soaking and burnt remains of a polaroid she took of them in Ronan's car goofing around and singing stupid songs and Blue smiles through the tears that escape. She turns it over and laughs, hard, because in tiny Noah handwriting it says 'Even dead, I have better music taste than all of you.' It's a joke from beyond, like Noah's standing there mocking her and she grins. "You little shit." She tucks the photo into her pocket and heads up to the car, where to her surprise Ronan is in the driver's seat, Gansey in the passenger and Adam in the back. "What's going on?" 

She gets in and slams the door and Ronan rev's the engine. "For old times sake," He says over his shoulder to her and presses his foot to the gas pedal and they take off and Blue sees Noah laughing and sticking his head out the window and chanting faster. 


End file.
